​January 4, 2013. Still in Stone Mountain. Thought about leaving New Years Eve but Jim decided he did not want to drive; stayed on New Years Day as it was raining and we did not want to leave in the rain. Called Dad as it was his 93rd birthday - Cindy & Bill were up there visiting with him for a few days. Glad to know he had company for the holiday since he still cannot drive and is stuck in his house. Of course, the ground is covered with snow and it's freezing up there so it's not something he should be driving in anyway.

So we left on Wednesday, January 2 and drove to Hope Hull, Alabama and stayed at Montgomery South RV Park just off I-65. It was a 190 mile drive for the day. Thursday was a longer day, about 250 miles to Bay St. Louis in Mississippi to Bay Hide Away campground. It has been raining in the south for the last few days and there is a lot of rain on the ground. There was a nice walking trail around the campground but had quite a few puddles in it. Did not want to let the dogs loose as it was too close to the campground to let them go. Friday took us to Duson, Louisiana to Frog City RV Park, just off I-10. Noisy here right near the highway and next to a truck stop. Good thing we are using Passport America at these places, so it has been costing us right around $20 each night. That is half price their normal rate, and in some of these places I just could not imagine paying that much money for a campsite. This place has a huge field where they have tenters and picnicing, but it has also been raining a lot and the field is pretty much flooded. I let the dogs run out there and did walk a little bit but did not want to get too much mud on my shoes.

Tomorrow we will arrive at our Texas destination and Josh texted that they will put a pot roast in the crock pot. Also said that they have all been sick and Karen has had the flu and has been in bed since Tuesday. Said that between being sick and the weather, they are all going stir crazy. We will be staying at Kemah RV Resort for the month of January in site 24 right on the corner. Drive will not be too long either, just about 164 miles.

January 10, 2012. We arrived in Houston on Saturday, January 5 and pulled in to Kemah RV Resort in Bacliff, Texas. After we got settled in we drove to Josh & Karen's for the evening to visit with them. Ellie was very glad to see us and jumped and played all evening. She is talking quite well and repeats everything you say to her. She is pretty smart and knows what she wants. Saturday night Grandma (she calls me me-ma) read her a story and sang her a song before going to sleep. It's a good thing she does not care what one's voice sounds like, since I cannot sing at all. She is now in a toddler bed with a swimmer's noodle under the sheet to help keep her from falling out of bed. I guess we left about 9:30 and she was still awake, not being able to settle down and get to sleep, not wanting to miss anything.

From the start we were not quite happy with the place. Our original site we reserved was not available and the site they wanted us to stay in was so small there would not have been any room to put out the awning. The site they did give us was bigger but right in front of the laundry room, which meant a lot of traffic going by the site. The whole resort was not what we had envisioned; there were a lot of residents and the campground was kind of run down. The bathrooms were not kept up and three out of the four were unusable. On Sunday we decided we wanted to go to a different campground so we spent part of the day traveling to different campgrounds and checking them out. We settled on Green Caye RV Resort in Dickinson, which is a bit closer to Josh & Karen's, and a lot nicer. It has a golf course connected to the resort with a store that is well equipped and clean; the restrooms and laundry are cleaned regularly. Sunday afternoon we went back over to Josh & Karen's to visit and have dinner.

There is also a large vacant lot next to the local high school and a park close by where I can take the dogs for a good run so they can get their daily exercise. We settled in on Monday and walked around the park checking it out. We are in site 57 which is a good long walk as sites 1 through about 65 are in one long row so when I take the dogs we have to walk from 57 all the way down the road to and then across the street to the vacant lot for their run. This is a very big park with a lot of rv sites as well as a village of small houses and apartments. I think they also lease houses around the area.

Wednesday I was walking the dogs in the vacant lot by the high school and came across a young girl's wallet which had money, bank cards, driver's license and her keys attached. There were also two business cards to a couple of banks where she had accounts and we tried calling them to have them get in touch with her so she could call us and get her stuff back. When we talked to them they said they called her and left messages but never got a return call. So on Friday we decided to take her stuff to the Dickinson Police Dept. and let them take care of her stuff. Don't know if they will let us know if they ever get it back to her or not. But that's OK; at least it's out of our hands now.

We got to babysit Ellie on Wednesday as Karen had an appointment. She was sleeping when we got there but did not seem to mind that mommy was not there when she woke up. She was glad to have Grandma & Grandpa there to play with. Stayed for dinner and Jim got to read to Ellie that night (Scupper's the Sailor Dog), which is Grandpa's favorite book, given to Josh by Bill & Julie when Josh was about 3 years old. Now it's Ellie's favorite book.

Just hung around the trailer Thursday & Friday, airing out the trailer from all the rain that's been coming down. The inside windows get full of water and the humidity is awful. Got the windows open and the sun shining in and dried it all out. Unfortunately, we are supposed to have a front come through with more rain coming for the next week before we get sun again. The next sun I see on the weather report is next Friday. Got the awning out to give us more outside area but the grass around us is so saturated it's like walking in a sponge.

January 16, 2013. We have been spending some time over at Josh's and Ellie just loves having us over. She is so delightful to be around and just wants to learn everything she can. We babysat again when Karen went to the doctor for her sinus and when she went to the Y for a women's training. Wednesday we went with her to Ellie's swimming lesson and watched her learning the basics of swimming - back float, going under and heading for the side of the pool, and finding the edge of the pool and hanging on. Mostly it is survival basics in the event she falls into a pool. She loves the water and has a blast at her lessons. She has had the same teacher since she began, over a year ago. They make learning fun and kind of make a game out of it so the kids enjoy it more. Soon she will be graduating and will go over to the deeper end of the pool.

We were going to meet the kids on Saturday and go to the Kemah Boardwalk but when we got into the Excursion, it turned over and started and then immediately died and would not start again. Called Good Sam Road Side Service and they found a mobile mechanic that actually came out to the campground to work on the Excursion. They brought some gas as well since we were really low on gas. Good Sam paid for the service call and the gas, but we paid for the actual work. Turned out we needed a fuel filter and the guy just crawled under the Excursion and checked the fuel pump as well to make sure we did not need one of those. We were lucky it was just the filter because the pump is located inside of the fuel tank and they would have had to drop the tank to change the pump. Jim went with the guy to Auto Zone and bought a filter; got it installed and it cost us 1-1/2 hours of time, about $135. By that time it was too late to meet with kids at the Boardwalk so we just went over to their house.

The weather was real crumby last weekend so we did not do anything on Sunday except go over to the kids' house and chill. The weather finally broke on Thursday (1/17) with the sun out and hitting the 60's. Looks like we are going to have some good weather for a week or so, and we are really glad about that. Stayed home today (1/17) to work on trailer, clean, and chill. Dogs seemed to enjoy staying home as well - they were tied up outside but sat in the sun and chilled. Hayley does not appear to enjoy herself as Ellie likes to run around the house and go after the dogs and Hayley does not care for that. She stays in the "dog room" with Maverick mostly and comes out after Ellies goes to bed. Lucy does not seem to care for Ellie jumping around, even though she just wants to snuggle with the dogs, they are not used to her.

Jim bought some lens polish and cleaned the headlights on the truck since they seemed kind of dull. Then we drove to check out a couple of RV sites for when we come back to visit and want to stay somewhere else. Did not care for the two we looked at today and we still have more to check out.

Tomorrow is Josh's 33rd birthday and we are planning on going out to dinner to celebrate. Where does the time go - 33 already!

January 22, 2013. Went to Galveston and visited the Ocean Star oil rig museum and spent the day walking through it and learning about how we drill for oil. Very interesting and informative.

Also talked with a couple here at the campground - Len & Ann - who are in their early 30's and early 40's and living in an RV workamping. His parents have been working at the oil fields doing gate guard for 3 years, and Len talked a lot about doing that kind of work and gave us a lot of good info in case we decide we want to do that one day.

January 25, 2013. Beautiful day in Houston so I decided to clean the trailer; starting with the windows and screens, which were filthy and really needed the dirt and mildew cleaned off of them. The grass here at the campground has clippings that just stick to the shoes and are tracked into the trailer. So I vacuumed, dusted, and swept the floor. Getting ready for the TCT rally next month.

January 27, 2013. What a pleasure it is to see Ellie - everytime we walk into their house she just goes nuts and really enjoys seeing us. Karen's Dad and JoAnn flew into town on January 23 for a week, so we went over their that night for dinner. Josh took Thursday off and we all went to Galveston to visit the Railroad Museum. One night after Ellie got ready for bed she wanted Scuppers read to her; went and grabbed it off the shelf and ran to Jim (papa) to have him read it to her. She's such a doll when she runs around the house playing. Went over there for dinner Saturday night after the men had an outing for the day going to the Battleship. Got to their house and she looks at us and her face lights up, clearly happy to see us. Interacting with her is fun as well; I pick her up and carry her around; we jump around the house playing; then sit down on the floor and put her rubber floor puzzle together that I got her for Christmas. Got her ready for bed Saturday night as well; washing her hands and face and brushing her teeth, then changing her diaper and putting her jammies on. Of course, she wanted Scuppers read to her to Jim got that job. Took her awhile to get to sleep - sounded like she was still awake when we left later that night.

January 28, 2012. Lazy Sunday here in Houston; kind of cloudy and overcast - good day to do the laundry. Was going to go grocery shopping but never made it. Jim talked on the phone with a couple of old friends then fell asleep for the rest of the afternoon. Took the dogs on a couple of walks around the resort - it's now 7:00pm and dark outside. Cannot wait until summer when it stays light longer. Staying here another week and then we are off to Mobile and then the panhandle of Florida before heading to Bushnell to visit Jack and then to the TCT ralley. Looking forward to seeing Bill & Julie at the ralley!

February 7, 2013. Visited with Josh & Karen a few times over the past week; enjoying seeing Ellie who runs into our arms and gives great hugs. She truly enjoys having us around, playing with her, reading her stories, giving her a bath and brushing her teeth; even putting her jammies on. Then she grabs "Scuppers" and runs to "Peepa" so he can read it to her. Such a joy.

About four days before our month was up I just so happened to mention to Jim that I thought we could change our domicile even though we still owned a house in Georgia. Other people have done it - Josh & Karen still own a house; Bill & Julie own a house in Maine but they are Florida residents. So, why couldn't we change? So we drove to Livingston so get that done. Went to the Tax Assessors office, got the Excursion registered but could not do the trailer because it was not "inspected." Texas website says that vehicles need to be inspected and since the trailer is not a vehicle, did not think it needed to be inspected. But the registration dept. said we could just mail in the documents. So we went to the DMV to get our driver's licenses and they would not do it because we did not have the trailer registered. My mistake showing them the complete paperwork on the insurance instead of just the Excursion card. Plus we needed to show them a few different documents on proof of residency. When we could not get our DL we went back to the tax assessor and got our money and documents back on the Excursion.

Today was our last day in Houston and we had to say goodbye last night and head out today. We decided to try to get our Texas driver's licenses again but that did not turn out to be the case. We got the trailer inspected this morning and got the form they require for transferring an out of state vehicle to Texas and then went to a local DMV to try to get our drivers licenses. They would not give them to us because we did not have the vehicles registered. Two hours wasted so as we were driving north on Texas 146 we talked about what we should do and decided to just drive on to Livingston and get the truck and trailer registered, then drive to Beaumont to get our drivers licenses. We have been warned that the lady at the Livingston DMV is not very pleasant to deal with (as we discovered on our own). So we are now giving this another attempt and hopefully it will work out this time.

February 9, 2013. Arrived in Livingston Thursday evening and stayed at the Escapees Rainbow's End park. Got up early Friday and headed off to the Dept. of Motor Vehicles to transfer our vehicles to Texas. We ended up at the same window as before so we dealt with the same girl as last time. She remembered us and the transfer went through smoothly. Got our license plates for the trailer and truck. A huge coincidence with the numbers on the trailer plate where the numbers on it are the same as that of our house - 461. Next stop was the driver's license department. I guess we got there early enough because we were the first customers, and the lady we dealt with previously was actually nice to deal with. It also helped to have the correct documents. What they needed was our vehicle registrations and proof of insurance (showing our Texas address), our passports (or original birth certificates), and original social security cards. Did not take much time at all, and we are now Texas residents.

February 10, 2013. Arrived in Biloxi on Saturday; staying at Martin Lake RV Resort. They sure do cram the people in here - but people come and stay. Met with Terry & Evelyn for the afternoon; had lunch and then went back to their RV and talked. Hayley and Lucy were beside themselves with joy seeing them again. Terry was their absolute favorite person at St. Croix because he would come over and see them and give them treats every day. The dogs fell in love with Terry and every time they heard their door open and saw his feet, they would run over to his trailer just to see him. And now to see them again seeing Terry & Evelyn was great - they were so happy. Tomorrow will need to do some laundry and a few geocaches. We need to get a souvenir from Mississippi to add to our collection. So now you may ask, what is geocaching? It's a fun scavender hunt - better described by visiting their own website - Geocaching.com.

February 11, 2013. Arrived at Styx River RV Resort, in Robertsdale, Alabama, which is a part of Ocean Canyon Properties. It is a resort like Thousand Trails or Coast to Coast, where one has to buy into the resort and then pay a reduced fee or free at other parks in the system. We got a three night stay for $20 but we have to listen to a 90 minute presentation Wednesday morning. We attended one of these many years ago through Thousand Trails in South Carolina. It is not a bad idea, especially when a night at an RV park costs an average of $30 x 30 = $900 x 12 = $10,800, and usually to buy into one of these places is much less.

Anyway, tomorrow we are meeting up with a friend we met at Amazon, Lavon Greathouse, and we are going to the USS Alabama to tour it and then maybe tour the Spanish Fort, which is along the Battleship causeway. Will get in some geocaching while we are here. Need to get an Alabama Souvenir since we were not able to get one from Mississippi - raining too hard.

Took a walk around the grounds today, and what a nice place they have. There is a huge common area with tables, pool tables, TV, work out equipment, indoor pool and jacuzzi, shuffleboard, pavilion with bar. There is also a trail down to the Styx River and a walking path from there. Took the dogs down there and they had a blast running along the path and even took a swim in the river. Good thing the river is shallow and does not flow very fast.

And another day of rain. There is a huge rain front coming through the area which is supposed to last another two days. Not supposed to clear out until Thursday.

Also need to get our Amazon applications back in the mail to them. Just need to finish them and get them in the mail. Sent back our Workamper Concierge paperwork in, and am also waiting to hear back from the Double Down Dog Run people.

February 12, 2013. Went over to Lavon's house and from there we went to the USS Alabama, through the rain. Very big ship and very easy to get lost in. Doors and ladders all over the place, and there does not seem to be an easy way to get from the starboard to the port side of the ship. Took us about three hours to tour the whole ship and then we went over to the submarine and walked through it. Finished up close to 5:00 pm and since the rain had stopped, I found a couple of geocaches to do in the area, so we showed Lavon about geocaching. The second one we did was at Meaher State Park and is hosted by the Alabama Start Park system. This was a tricky one - a bird house nailed shut and you had to figure out how to open it. We almost gave up because we did not see any way of getting in it. I read back on a few posts and one gave a clue saying that it took them to figure out how to open it, and after that we figured it out. :)

February 17, 2013. Tomorrow is Jacklyn's birthday - 24 years old already. My, my, where does the time go? Anyway, we have spent a week here at Styx River Resort, which is owned by Ocean Canyon Properties. It is one of their newer properties and they are working on updating it and adding new sites and other things. There is a short path down to the Styx River where they have picnics and swimming in the summer; as well as a path down along the river for walking.

Took the dogs down there for their morning and evening walks for a few days, but had to stop when they took off after a deer and did not come back for a while. In fact, Lucy eventually came back but Hayley kept after it right down to the shooting range, which is just down the street from the park. I was just about to call Jim to see if she made her way back to the trailer when he called and said that the shooting range called to say that Hayley was down there. They said they saw the deer run across the back end of the range and then a minute later, there goes Hayley. I am glad she had the wherewithall to go back to the range, and a good thing we have her name and phone number on a tag.

Since we are going to be traveling in the RV for the rest of our days (hopefully) we have decided to purchase a life membership in Ocean Canyon Properties, which will include their eight resorts plus all the Coast to Coast properties and Resorts of Distinction properties that we can stay at. All told, if we just traveled without workamping, the camping fees would be much greater than the cost of our membership. Plus, our children can stay at any of the properties and we can will our membership to them and our grandchildren, so they can stay at these places at no charge. It's a great concept as they have resorts all around the country.

We have given our resume to the people here and our plan is to get a job at their Texas location and try to start there in November, if we do not go back to Amazon.

Today we need to head out of here though as we need to be in Brooksville, Florida on Wednesday for the TCT rally. We are going to spend two days at Geronimo RV Resort in Miramar Beach, Florida and one day at Old Pavilion RV Park in Keaton Beach, Florida before heading to Sertoma Youth Range on Wednesday.

February 21, 2013. Got to Sertoma Youth Ranch on Wednesday afternoon and shortly after setting up Bill & Julie pulled in. They set up next to us and we walked around the park a little to see what is going on. Later we drove into Dade City, just 12 miles south of the campground to meet up with Lisa and have dinner at a Mexican Restaurant. Met Forrest and his wife Jerry at the same place and they joined us for dinner.

When we got back to the trailer Jim had set up the little TV outside and I tried to play the two DVDs that I had redone from VHS tapes that Julie had done for me back when the kids were real little. I had never played the DVDs and I guess something did not go right during the conversion process and the DVDs were not watchable. They kept freezing and then did not go any further. So I put in the DVD "Roam Sweet Home" which has a short clip featuring Jack & Marge Culp.

Thursday we drove up to Bushnell to vist with Jack as we were told he was not doing very good health wise. That is an understatement. He was emaciated and has a sores on his legs that he did not get treated and they are eating away at this body; smells like death and decay in his trailer. There are flies everywhere, rotten food, trash and garbage, and he has not changed his clothes and looks like he goes to the bathroom in them. He says he just wants to die in his trailer and is doing nothing to stop that from happening. It was good to see him but very disgusting; do not know how one could allow that to happen to himself; you would not treat an animal the way he is allowing himself to go. People are saying that he may not last through the weekend.

February 27, 2013. Sitting here at the house but things are not going well. Came in Monday afternoon; while walking around the property we mentioned the ditch and the work Frank has been doing on it; I guess he thought we were talking about him; the fence; or whatever, but he got a hair up his up his butt and turned off the water from their house to our house - I think it is just because he thought we were talking about him. So at 10:00 Monday night we had to hook up and move to Stone Mountain Park campground just so Jacklyn and Joe would have water. Frank is such a control freak; it really makes us mad since Jacklyn & Joe are hooked up to their house.

Today we talked with a well person to have them come out and look at the well and give us an estimate. We also are going to file an insurance claim because at the time the well went out a bad storm was coming through Atlanta and that may have caused the well to go out.

In addition, while we were at Stone Mountain Park campground it was raining and raining pretty good; we put out the awning to keep the water off of us, but at 6:30am on Tuesday we heard an awful crash - the water must have made its way between the layers of the awning and caused it to crash in and fall apart. I have filed a claim with the insurance company and am waiting for the adjuster to come and see about it.

We are also trying to get the well fixed. We talked with a well person but he has not called back to set up a time to come out and look at the well. We are also going to file an insurance claim about the well as well since there was some awful weather that came through at the same time the well went out. Hopefully the insurance will pay for that as well.

February 28, 2013. Well guys came out yesterday about 11:00 am and started working on the well. Had to pull it straight up from underground; all 11 pipes and wire. Found a broken wire half way down but pulled it all up just to check the pump and make sure everything else was OK. Fixed the wire and set everything back into the well. Then put in a new tank as the old one was not working up to par. So, six hours and $835 later, we have our well working again. Hooray! We are finally not under Frank's control anymore - what a hassle that was.

We are staying here until Sunday and will drive up to Jack's house and spend the night there so we can be at Camping World by 10:00 am Monday morning to get our new awning installed. Right after that we will be on our way to Tennessee and our new workamping position at Tremont RV Resort.